Harry the Poisonous Centipede (6 page)

“Anyway, it's silly,” said Harry, when he could make himself heard. “We don't want to get hurt or killed.”

“Last night I was chased by a hairy biter,” boasted George. “It jumped down out of a tree and chased me. But I felt it hit the ground and I ran straight between its legs and up the tree and into a crack where it couldn't get me! I wasn't scared! Big clumsy thing, I heard it coming a mile off!”

Harry wasn't sure whether to believe him. George was a big show-off.

“Maybe you're braver than me,” he said. “But I've got more sense than you, anyway!”

And he turned and ran down a tunnel.

After a bit, George came after him.

“All right. All right. If you don't want to go up to the no-top-world, think of something exciting to do down here.”

Harry didn't say anything. Something more than just exciting had popped into his head at once.

He moved his front feelers about in a thoughtful way. George guessed that he had something interesting in his mind.

“What? WHAT?” he crackled, waving his legs in ripples of excitement along his sides.

“The Up-Pipe. But we mustn't.”

“What's the Up-Pipe?”

“It's a kind of tunnel. But we can't go up it.”

“Mama said not to, I suppose!” jeered George.

“Yes, she did. Because it leads to the Place of Hoo-Mins.”

George stopped making ripples. “Hoo-Mins? What's that?”

“I thought you said you knew about Hoo-Mins.”

George looked uncomfortable.

“I thought they were just another kind of hairy biter,” he said. “Go on then.

Tell me what they are.”

Harry told him, as well as he could. He'd never seen one himself.

“Well, you know we sometimes hear very big vibrations. And you know how Mama never, ever goes up to see what they are. That's them. They're giant twolegses. As big as trees. Each one of their feet is as big as a whole hairy biter. And they're fast. They try to Get you by smashing you with their shadows.” (Harry had got in a bit of a muddle.)

“Can you eat them?”

“Eat
them?
Oh, sure, of course! A nice little snack!” George looked blank. “Well, could you drag a tree home, stupid?”

They both started laughing. They laughed till they rolled on their backs. Then suddenly George jerked himself right side up and said, “I want to see one.”

“They only come out in the
bright-time,” Harry said.

“We could stay awake and go up in the bright-time.”

“Up the Up-Pipe?” asked Harry in a shocked crackle.

“Are they only up the Up-Pipe?”

“No. Mama told me one chased her on the no-top-world.”

“So, we could just peep at them through a hole,” said George. “But show me the Up-Pipe first.”

“No.”

“Oh, go on! It can't hurt to look! I dare you to show it to me.”

Harry couldn't resist a dare. So he said, “All right then. But remember. It's not the Up-Pipe that's dangerous. It's the Hoo-Mins who live at the top.”

Harry led George along the forbidden tunnel to the pool. As before, there was a faint light in the earth-cave. The two centis stood under the light and stared up.

“The Up-Pipe!” breathed George. He was impressed.

“Mama says the sides are slippery and hard to grip,” said Harry.

“I bet we could climb it!” said George.

“How could we reach it?”

“Easy. We could pile up some earth.
Then if you stood on the pile with most of your segments upright, I could climb up you and get hold with my front four or six feet. When I'd got a good grip, you could climb up the rest of my segments. I'd leave them hanging down for you.”

“What would you hold on to?”

“See that rough place near the beginning of the pipe? I'd hold that. We could do it. I know we could. Oh, come on, Hx, let's!”

Harry shook his round little head.

“And what when we got to the top? What if a Hoo-Min saw us?”

“We'd turn right round and go back down! If they're as big as you said, they couldn't possibly follow us!”

And George at once started scuffling about with his front eight pairs of legs and his head, pushing loose earth into a pile like a platform, under the Up-Pipe.

Suddenly, far above their heads, they heard something.

It was a thumping. A noise of something heavy, coming down bump, right over where they were!

They both went tense. Harry said, “It's a Hoo-Min! Let's go!”

George said, “Wait!”

They crouched there on the earth-pile. The thumping went on. It wasn't regular. There was a thump.

A pause. Another thump.

Nothing else happened. At first.

“It's walking! When it stops, we'll go up!” crackled George.

And he would have too. Only suddenly there was another noise.

It was a swish. A pattering like rain on the surface. And then—!

A great gurgle!

A WHOOSH!

And before they could think what to do, something came plummeting down towards them!

What came down the Up-Pipe now was like a post that Harry had once seen, being driven down into the earth. Only this post wasn't made of wood.

It was made of water.

When it hit them it nearly knocked them out. They were washed off the mound of earth. The mound of earth was swept away. The water began to carry them along in a gurgling, bubbling torrent.

Harry recovered first. He managed to grab George with his poison-pincers as
he was swept past. Of course he didn't inject his poison. He just used the pincers to hold on to his friend.

They clung together. The water-post was still coming down, but they weren't under it any more.

The water was all around them like a living thing, but for Harry, this wasn't new. He'd been through it before. He knew what to do.

“Swim!” he crackled. “Ripple your legs! Make for the earth!”

The water was rushing, pulling, carrying them. George just thrashed around uselessly. But Harry swam! He actually swam, just as if he'd been a true marine centi! When he had to, he found he could. If he hadn't, George would have drowned.

He managed to signal to George to keep upright so his breathing holes didn't
get swamped. He even managed to hold George up till he got the idea. He dragged him along, fighting the strong current.

And by swimming his hardest, Harry made it to the edge of the water.

They dragged themselves on to the black, muddy shore. They lay there, exhausted.

George couldn't make even a faint crackle. He just lay there.

Harry got up slowly and shook the water off his cuticle. He rubbed the water out of his eyes with his pincers. He pushed George.

“Come on! Get up! You're all right.”

George lifted his head. Centipedes can't cry, but if they could, George would have been crying.

“No, I'm not. I'm not,” he said, and dropped his head again. His feelers stretched miserably along the ground. “I think I'm dead.”

“You are not. You're as alive as I am.” Harry gave him a non-poisonous pinch with his pincers.

“Ouch! Don't DO that!” George sat up and shook himself.

Harry was feeling very pleased with himself. He could really and truly swim! And he'd rescued George – saved his life!

“What about the Up-Pipe then?” he teased. “Shall we go?”

“Oh, shut up,” said George. But he got up and trailed after Harry along the edge of the rushing river of water, back to where they'd been.

The water wasn't rushing down from the Up-Pipe any more. Just trickling.

“Why did the Hoo-Mins send water down?” asked George. He was still trembling.

“Probably to Get us! Mama said they're the most dangerousest things in the world.”

“Well, they missed us!” said George, sounding a bit more like himself.

“This time,” said Harry. “But don't count your ants' eggs if we tangle with them again!”

You might think that this adventure would have stopped George wanting to have anything to do with the dreaded Hoo-Mins.

But George had a short memory for fear.

“Those Hoo-Mins!” he said to Harry, only a few days later. “Trying to Get us with the water! How did they know we were there?”

“Don't talk about it,” said Harry.

“They must be quite something!”

“Something to keep well away from.”

“Yes. Sure. Except—”

“What?”

“I do just want to see one!”

“WE ARE NOT GOING UP THE UP-PIPE, and that's IT!” shouted Harry.

“I didn't mean that. I meant, we could sneak up a tunnel during the bright-time and have a peep at one.”

This couldn't help seeming like a pretty exciting idea to Harry. He had a picture in his mind of a Hoo-Min. It looked like a tree that could move, with two feet like hairy biters.

He looked at George for a long time and waved his feelers about in a slow and thoughtful way. Suddenly they shot straight up. This is a centi's way of saying “YES! Let's go for it!”